[WOTC] Minis Spotlight

[Pramas]

(Chris Pramas's outline of his approach to the game snipped)

Damn, Chris, that sounds like it would have been seriously cool.

I'm not sure I would have bought the starter idea as is -- ($13 x number of players) does seem a little high as a jump-in point, and I think I would have preferred to see 3 sets of 5-6 figures. OTOH, 3 good metal figures is a pretty good deal at $13, so maybe the figures themselves would have carried people over the "try it" threshold.

That was the idea. For $13 you'd get to try the game. If you didn't like it, hey, you still got 3 figs you could use. I thought letting folks choose their faction was important, because not everyone wants the figs in a fixed 2 faction starter.

Sigh. <b>Now</b> I want a big box Freedom City miniatures set -- every supercharacter mentioned in the book, plus an assortment of mooks and other characters. Charge me whatever you want... I'll pay it with mad glee...

If all goes well, we're going to have a Nocturnals promo mini at Comic Con and GenCon. If that goes over well, who knows what the future might hold?

 

[Pramas]

What annoys me about the entire D&D miniatures debacle is that the first wave of WotC figures were great. I still consider them to be amongst the best minis I own. I'd really love the chance to buy another Regdar.

There was a big debate internally about whether or not a separate line of D&D minis should be produced once Chainmail launched. I was in favor of keeping the RPG line going because there are minis you want for your RPG that aren't going to work in a skirmish game. As it was we had to try to make the Chainmail minis dual purpose and that meant compromises all around. For instance, I had originally wanted the dwarves of Mordengard, who founded a workers state after toppling a tyrant, to look like they came from Soviet propaganda posters. Strong, earnest looking dwarves in workers smocks or metal workers aprons with big hammers and the like. Well, since the Mordengard dwarves had to double as Player Character minis, we had to go with a more traditional look for them. They were still nice minis, but not as flavorful as they might have been. Another example: we had to make up new demons for Naresh because the MM demons were just too powerful for Chainmail. While these were later added to D&D via MM2, the original MM demons never got done. Towards the end of the metal line, they tried to "repurpose" some of the Chainmail minis in some D&D boxed sets (Heroes and Monsters 2 and 3), but it was too late at that point.

There are many lessons to be learned from Chainmail. It'll be interesting to see if any of them get applied to the new venture. For my part, I know I underestimated the importance of servicing the RPG market when we started up minis at WotC. I don't know that the new game took that lesson to heart (since the whole plan is to let the "secondary market" service the roleplayers), but the guy who has been in charge of minis since I left is a good guy (I wish he had taken over much earlier and spared me from having to deal with his predecessor) so who knows how it'll turn out.

 

[frankthedm]

Ok I can't promise this guy isn't fibbing, but it is interesting.

from http://www.mkrealms.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&threadid=82031 on 06/09/2003 09:35
Barronmore
Warlord


I had a long talk with the Wizards people when I first saw them at GAMA, here's the highlights of that discussion and the figs I saw on display.

The game is not CHAINMAIL, and they don't like the "C" word associated with it. It's offical name is the D&D minitures game. The game will be marketed in two ways. First is the mini game itself. IT's fully collectable, comes pre-painted and the rulebook will be about 40 pages. They are really trimming the fat since the Chainmail game was considered too cluttered. THe line of figs will be right out of the d20 system and the "Iconics" (unique characters) will be based on their flagship characters from the various D&D supplaments.

Like chainmail, the stats for the figs will be kept on cards. The figs are based on regular 1" round bases and are designed to be used for the roleplaying games as well.

The 2nd marketing tactic ties in with the cards. On one side of the card will be all the infornmation to play the game. The second side of the card will contain a mini-character sheet for the d20 system. The models are incouraged to be used as both a tactics game and for RPing. IN the future, WotC is planning on releaseing a mini supplement for D&D that will allow players to use the models in the D&D system more easilly. the gameside of the card will also be used as a "quick combat" system to solve unimportant encounters.

The idea sounds great on paper. The prices quoted above are correct so the game will be cheep to get into. The paintjobs at GAMA were really great and there were about 100+ figs on display. Yes, somre were Chainmail figs recasted, but quite a few were unique figs not from chainmail.

Oh, on the rarity issue. There will be commons, uncommons, and rares. The scale of the figs is accurate (ogres, trolls, etc are all much larger) and works into the rarity. The largescale figs are all rares.

That's all strait from the horse's mouth after about 1 1/2 - 2 hours of interrigation. The wizards people were really nice about answering the questions I asked them. Just remember, this game is not chainmail, and they don't want you to associate it with chainmail either.

Barronmore

 

[Nikchick]

...Just remember, this game is not chainmail, and they don't want you to associate it with chainmail either.

But of course, they want to distance their new project from the 'failure' of Chainmail! Anyone remember this golden oldie announcement?

"After a careful examination, the publishing business unit of Wizards of the Coast has determined that it needs to make a strategic shift in the miniatures category. We will no longer promote the Chainmail brand. Wizards will continue to produce miniatures, and we are currently working on our 2003 schedule, along with a business plan for a game that uses the Dungeons & Dragons brand. We intend to make the new game backward-compatible with Chainmail."


(Emphasis mine...)

Sure, kids, it'll work with that other game we convinced you to buy last year! It'll be like Chainmail, but better... only don't call it Chainmail, or think of it in terms of Chainmail. It's the same, only completely different!

Nicole

 

[Ankh-Morpork Guard]

Well there's something that could upset some people...larger creatures as rares. Hmmm...I'm not too sure I really like that all that much, but I do understand the rational in that they'd be 'more powerful' than normal creatures...still...hmm...

 

[frankthedm]

trust me, IF its true, I'm upset

I posted this on wotc's boards yesterday

"I am deeply worried the rare figs will be the much needed monsters that there are so few of in the miniature market. PCs and bipedals abound in the mini market, Monsters are what are needed. Will DM’s be forced to buy cases of minis or be gouged for “rare” figs in the after market?"

 

[redkobold]

Whooo hoo! Those paint jobs make the rather nice figure designs look like capital C-R-A-P. I am assuming that they picked out the nicely painted ones from the batch. Scary!

The paint job almost had me convinced to NOT but the figures until I looked a little more closely at the figure designs.

I was really excited about the Chainmail line and think this idea would be ok if the "commons" were available in a separate package unpainted for the secondary market uninterested in "collecting".

The pricing is nice. Because of this, I may end up purchasing a pack to see if I can easily remove the paint with the Pinsol stripper.

Anyone have any ideas how easy or difficult this will be based on other prepainted figure games like MK?

Speaking of MK, it was cool that metal versions of the figs were released. HINT HINT.

 

[Zaruthustran]

Anyone have any ideas how easy or difficult this will be based on other prepainted figure games like MK?

Speaking of MK, it was cool that metal versions of the figs were released. HINT HINT.

Why ever would you want to strip and repaint a plastic mini?

If you want to paint, good grief--get yourself a metal mini. The detail is much better. And you don't have to strip existing paint.

As for MK metals: they sold like dogs. And retailers were reluctant to carry them.

-z

 

[frankthedm]

Why ever would you want to strip and repaint a plastic mini?
-z

1. The models themselves are sometime quite cool under the 1 to 2 mm thick paint jobs. Several MageKnight magespawn are very cool and unique monsters.

2. You can get the more common mage knights and heroclix for under a buck at places like www.pjcc.com.

3. Doing a quick acetone scrub isn't that hard.

 

[MerricB]

Well there's something that could upset some people...larger creatures as rares. Hmmm...I'm not too sure I really like that all that much, but I do understand the rational in that they'd be 'more powerful' than normal creatures...still...hmm...

I'd assume it's simply because of cost - it costs more to make larger figures, so they limit them to one/pack. Also, consider a pack with 5 large figures... they might not fit in the booster any more.

(Don't expect figures of colossal monsters except as stand alones, they won't fit in a booster!)

Cheers!